Kramnik, Zvjaginsev strike in round two

12/20/2005 – After his shock defeat in round one, the first classical chess loss to friend Peter Svidler ever, Vladimir Kramnik rebounded with a fine win against Sergey Volkov. Replacement Vadim Svjaginsev played the cheeky 1.e4 c5 2.Na3?! against former world champion Khalifman – and scored a full point. Illustrated report.

Svidler beats Kramnik in Russian Championship

12/20/2005 – The "Superfinal" stage of the 58th Russian Championship – 11 rounds all play all – began with a face-off between the two top seeds. Peter Svidler from St Petersburg demolished the iron Petroff of his friend and rival Vladimir Kramnik. Sergei Rublevsky did the same to the French Tarrash of Evgeny Bareev. Report, games and results.

Levon Aronian wins FIDE World Cup

12/18/2005 – This knockout tournament of 128 players would, a year ago, have been the FIDE world championship title. The 23-year-old Armenian Levon Aronian won it, following in the footsteps of Karpov, Khalifman, Anand, Ponomariov and Kasimdzhanov. In the final round, yet another exciting affair, he beat Ruslan Ponomariov to take the title. Big illustrated report with analysis and statistics.

Savielly Tartakower – the game's greatest aphorist

12/17/2005 – He was a real maverick in the opening, willing to essay romantic and especially hypermodern ideas against even the strongest of players. Yet Tartakower, as befits a world-class player, excelled in all parts of the game. In this week's Playchess lecture Dennis Monokroussos illustrates with a great victory over Geza Maroczy in 1922. Come and watch.

More excitement – Aronian-Ponomariov draw

12/17/2005 – The fight for first place goes on in the FIDE World Cup in Khanty Mansiysk. The two "youngsters" Levon Aronian and Ruslan Ponomariov played another super-sharp game which was a joy to watch. Gata Kamsky equalised against Magnus Carlsen, so it all comes down to the tiebreaks tomorrow. Report, pictures and interviews.

Three magnificent games in Khanty

12/16/2005 – Playing for first place Ruslan Ponomariov and Levon Aronian fought uncompromisingly, and ended their game in a razor-sharp draw. Carlsen-Kamsky was a beautiful attacking effort by the 15-year-old Norwegian, and crowned by victory. And Malakhov outplayed Vallejo in a game you will want to study. Illustrated report.

Enrico Paoli: 13.01.1908 – 15.12.2005

12/16/2005 – He was the strongest active (!) nonagenarian in the world, who won his last Italian championship title at the age of 60 and once beat Kotov with black. Enrico Paoli, GM honoris causa, was the initiator and organiser of the famous Reggio Emilia tournament. This week he passed away less than a month before his 98th birthday. In memoriam.

Khanty-Mansiysk: The prodigies are through

12/15/2005 – All three are famous chess prodigies: Gata Kamsky drew attention to himself in the late eighties, 22-year-old Ruslan Ponomariov became a grandmaster at 14, and Magnus Carlsen is at 15 one of the hottest commodities in chess today. All three went through in the FIDE world cup in Siberia. Tomorrow it's prodigy vs prodigy.

A historical Mediterrean holiday and chess championship

12/14/2005 – Like to combine a holiday in a beautiful seaside resort with a battle for the European Individual Championships? Visit one of the great wonders of the Ancient World and play for a €78,000 prize fund? The Turkish Chess Federation is inviting you to Kusadasi next April to take part in what promises to be an extraordinary chess tournament.

The Talented Mr Agdestein

12/14/2005 – Simen Agdestein, 38, is Norway's strongest player, having won the national title a total of seven times. He was a grandmaster at 18 and runner-up in the World Junior Championship in 1986, ahead of Anand, Bareev and Piket. Simen also represented his country in football, playing for the A-team until a knee injury stopped this career. Now he is going for something new: ballroom dancing.

The XYZ of the Benko Gambit

12/13/2005 – Just before recording his new "ABC of the Benko Gambit" DVD our chess trainer Andrew Martin, in his Wednesday night Playchess lecture, takes a look at Cheparinov-Ivanchuk from the FIDE World Championship. Black faltered, but Martin has some interesting improvements. Tune in...

Bobby Fischer's life for sale – on eBay

12/13/2005 – When he dropped out of public view in the seventies, World Champion Bobby Fischer placed all of his most valuable belongings into a Pasadena storage unit. Some years ago the contents were sold off by the landlord, apparently in response to nonpayment of rent. Now the Fischer memorabilia have appeared on eBay. Reactions...

Aronian in the final – Winter in Khanty-Mansiysk

12/13/2005 – The only decisive game in the semifinals so far was Levon Aronian's victory over Etienne Bacrot. The Armenian GM proceeds to the final, while Ponomariov and Grischuk decide who faces him in the tiebreaks tomorrow. Gelfand beat Gurevich in the second group. Viktoria Abakumovskikh has sent us a lovely winter photo report.

Playchess on your cellphone

12/12/2005 – ChessBase is currently testing new software that gives you direct access to the Playchess.com server on your cellphone. You can log in, watch games, follow broadcasts, even play against other visitors. This is possible using our client software Fritz Mobile, which is in the test phase. Try it out – it's free.

Khanty-Mansiysk: First games in semifinals drawn

12/12/2005 – Both the semifinal games of the FIDE World Cup were drawn, one uneventfully and one with a bit of excitement. In the matches for the places 5-16 there were two decided encounters: Boris Gelfand beat Mikhail Gurevich by refuting his over-ambitious attack; and Konstantin Sakaev spoilt a very nice game against Dreev with a capital blunder. Report and interviews.

McShane vs Kotronias – Chess for Zebras

12/11/2005 – In his Monday night Playchess lecture Dennis Monokroussos, influenced by Jonathan Rowson's latest book, shows us a Trompowsky game in which goes above the call to generate something new and peculiar. Learn some "Tromp" theory, loosen up your categories.

Grischuk and Vallejo advance to round six

12/11/2005 – All rapid games in the fifth round tiebreaks in Khanty were drawn, so the final places for the next round were decided in blitz games. Alexander Grischuk won both of his against Gelfand to book his place in the semifinals, while Francisco Vallejo Pons beat Dutch champion Loek van Wely to advance in the fight for places 9-16. Report and games.

Gelfand defeats Grischuk, Kamsky and Malakhov win

12/10/2005 – In round five of the FIDE World Cup three games were drawn. Only Boris Gelfand of Israel outplayed the young Russian hopeful Alexander Grischuk, 15 years his junior, to take a full point. In the battle for places 9-16 Gata Kamsky and Vladimir Malakhov scored. Results and games.

Chess is Cool – podcast with Alexandra Kosteniuk

12/10/2005 – Podcasting is essentially the Internet version of radio on demand, a method of distributing audio programs which users can replay at will on their computers, MP3 players or even cellphones. There are over 25,000 podcasts currently available, on countless subjects. Chess grandmaster Alexandra Kosteniuk provides us with fresh chess content. Go listen.

The Beer Sheva Chess Club

12/10/2005 – The city of Beer Sheva in Israel boasts a higher percentage of GMs per capita – one for every 22,875 residents – than any other city in the world. Recently it paid host to the World Team Championship, which was highly appropriate, since it is home to Eliahu Levant’s famous Beer Sheva Chess Club. Here's the story.

Making sense of the FIDE cycle

12/10/2005 – Why, many of our readers have asked, are eight players who got knocked out in round four of the World Cup in Khanty-Mansiysk still playing in the tournament? What, they want to know, is the point? Has it something to do with the 2007 FIDE world championship cycle? It most certainly does. Jeff Sonas explains in meticulous detail. Please concentrate.

Ponomariov, Bacrot, Aronian through

12/10/2005 – Three players went through to the semi-final stage of the FIDE World Cup three, while Grischuk fought back to even his loss against Gelfand in game one. Magnus Carlsen beat Joel Lautier in the second group, Kamsky was successful over Sakaev, as was Malakhov over Dreev. Full illustrated report.

Eco and distributed computing

12/10/2005 – Is chess mathematically solvable? It's an idea which has been bounced around on computer chess message boards for years. Can a chessplaying program find a forced win for either player? Can a chess engine even find an advantage after twenty moves in a specific variation? We crunch some numbers and melt a few calculators in this week's ChessBase Workshop.

Bareev defeats Carlsen, Bacrot KO's Lautier

12/9/2005 – For young Magnus Carlsen (picture) the rocket ship ride in Khanty-Mansiysk has come to a tragic end. In the tiebreaks against Evgeny Bareev he turned a lovely win into a traumatic loss. The French civil war was duly won by Etienne Bacrot. Levon Aronian eliminated Vallejo Pons, Boris Gelfand ground down Alexey Dreev. Report and games.